Republican lawmaker Myra Crownover of Denton did women in Texas the greatest of disservices, ironically on International Women's Day, when she made this myth-perpetuating statement this morning:

“I would be curious to see how many times a pure, sober sexual assault happened. The best chance is being sober.”

My first thought was of the young woman who recently came forward at Baylor to report her sexual assault, allegedly by a fraternity president, last month. The latest alleged rape out of Baylor had all the earmarks of the sordid stories we know so well: She went to a party, was handed some kind of punch, lost consciousness and awoke to being sexually assaulted.

But beyond that date-rape scenario is the idea that a woman is somehow complicit in her own sexual assault just because she chooses to drink alcohol. That thinking is tantamount to "wearing provocative clothing" or similar nonsense.

Yes, as I've written previously, of course alcohol is part of the conversation, but often because sexual predators use intoxication as part of their plot. Yes, alcohol smears the lens in these stories. But it's not the start or end point of the conversation. If we don't get more sophisticated in this thinking, we'll never get to solutions.

Here's the place we need to start the discussions, neatly summed up by Jessica Valenti in her book The Purity Myth:

“Women don’t get raped because they were drinking or took drugs. Women do not get raped because they weren’t careful enough. Women get raped because someone raped them.”

Crownover, who made her remarks this morning at a House Higher Education Committee hearing, later expanded in this statement to The Dallas Morning News:

“My statements this morning in the Higher Education hearing were taken out of context.”

“Let me be clear, whether or not the victim of a sexual assault was intoxicated does not mitigate, condone or excuse the actions of the other party. However, I do not think we can properly address the issue of sexual assault on college campuses without also discussing the role drugs and alcohol play in this important issue,” she added.”

In many ways, it's comforting to remember that Crownover did not seek re-election and is ending her time in Austin. Good riddance, if she can't get past this old understanding of rape and women's so-called complicity in it.

But it's worth noting that people far more nuanced than Crownover have also tried to engage on this topic -- only to have similar backlash. Putting pitchforks into the backs of one another can feel good -- especially in an outrageous example such as this. Yet the social media tar and feathering doesn't push the conversation forward any more than Crownover's remarks did.

We're all replaying the same old tapes. And that's not helping young women try to figure out how to navigate these waters one bit.

My hope is that we can channel our anger about incidents like this one to truly change the culture and bring about the honest discussions necessary. So as we all fire off a tweet of outrage over Crownover's ignorance, let's consider how we can be part of constructive solutions as well.

(One other sad side note to today's testimony: According to the Texas Tribune, when Baylor's Kevin Jackson, vice president of student life, testified, he was not asked any tough questions. Sadly, this happened instead (more evidence that our lawmakers just don't get it):

Jackson didn't face many tough questions during his 20 minutes of testimony. None of the committee members asked about specific complaints of mishandling by Baylor. At one point, Rep. Travis Clardy, R-Nacogdoches, told Jackson that he was unhappy with the school. But the reason had nothing to do with sexual assault. He jokingly said he was angry because the university stole the president of his former law school. Kenneth Starr presided over the Pepperdine University law school before he took the top job at Baylor.

What a chummy moment for a university that owes us some straightforward answers.